Communication between the United States and Soviet Union has made significant progress in recent years, said a former Soviet translator last night.

"People have come to place their hopes on the United Nations . . . to prevent conflicts," said Victor Sukhodrev, special assistant to the Secretary General of the United Nations.

Sukhodrev's speech, titled "The United Nations in a Changing World," was part of the 16th annual International Festival.

"He is a very interesting speaker who has intriguing observations to offer," said Jim Lynch, director of the Office of International Students.

Sukhodrev has worked as an interpreter for such Soviet leaders as Nikita Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev and Mikhail Gorbachev.

"Today, common sense has prevailed at long last," he said. "It's prompted by tremendous changes in the Soviet Union."

The United Nations was created after World War II to give peace a more secure foundation, Sukhodrev said. He added that its purpose was "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war."

The United Nations did not meet its intended goals at first, Sukhodrev said. There was a climate of fear and suspicion that resulted in unresolved issues, leading to the development of the Cold War, he added.

"The two blocs (the United States and the Soviet Union) were seeking to compete for who could be ruder to the other," Sukhodrev said. "Resolutions had no real meaning for the world."

Yet Sukhodrev said that recent breakthroughs, such as Soviet-U.S. resolutions on important issues like arms reduction, have improved global relations.

"The United Nations today is in a post-confrontational era," he said.

The United Nations has also succeeded in many endeavors like the definition of human rights and the codification of international laws, Sukhodrev said.

He added that the U.N. Security Council has helped avert major catastrophes such as the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.

"The United Nations charter was a kind of a sleeping beauty (in the beginning)," he said. "Today the sleeping beauty has been aroused from slumber."

Sukhodrev said there are still issues which the United Nations needs to address, including the solution to problems in Cambodia, preventive diplomacy, and an end to hunger and social injustice -- problems that have no ideology.

"I wanted to learn how the United Nations works," said Erol Kaya (graduate-mineral sciences), who added he thought the speech was very good for the University.

Before he answered questions from the audience, Sukhodrev said he was optimistic about the future of the United Nations, "a future that only a short time ago seemed inconceivable."

"The audience is smaller than we hoped for, but certainly a lively audience," Lynch said.